Subject: US-Medien ignorieren Veteranenprotest in Washington, DC
News Black-Out in DC: Pay No Attention to Those Veterans Chained to the White House Fence
Sat, 12/18/2010 - 12:06
There was a black-out and a white-out Thursday and Friday as over a hundred US veterans opposed to US wars in Afghanistan and elsewhere
around the world, and their civilian supporters, chained and tied themselves to the White House fence during an early snowstorm to say
enough is enough. Washington Police arrested 135 of the protesters, in what is being called the largest mass detention in recent years.
Among those arrested were Ray McGovern, a former CIA analyst who used to provide the president’s daily briefings, Daniel Ellsberg,
who released the government’s Pentagon Papers during the Nixon administration, and Chris Hedges, former war correspondent for the
New York Times.
No major US news media reported on the demonstration or the arrests.
[...]
Mehr hier...
http://www.thiscantbehappening.net

This
Conference, calls on the Executive Committee of Amnesty International Ireland to
refer the case of the former Director of Radio Television Serbia, Mr Dragolub
Milanovic, to the AI International Secretariat for investigation and, if Mr
Milanovic is determined to be an individual at risk as a Prisoner Of Conscience,
to campaign for his release.

Proposed: June Kelly, Amnesty International Ireland member, Mullingar, County
Westmeath.

An international movement has been established to
protest the already 8 year long (of a 10 year sentence) imprisonment of former
Director of Radio Television Serbia (RTS). RTS was bombed by NATO during the
course of NATO’s horrific and illegal 78 day bombing campaign against the
peoples of the multi ethnic state of Serbia. The NATO air raids began on 24th
March 1999. (1)

During March and April 1999, RTS’s dedicated workers
willingly risked danger to transmit to the world words and images about the NATO
bombardment that was targeting the Serbian infrastructure and slaughtering
civilians. Early NATO statements focused on the need to “degrade” the Serbian
government’s “ability to transmit their version of the news”. (NATO press
briefing, April 23rd 2000).

NATO bombs and rockets destroyed 10 private radio
and television stations and 50 TV transmitters and relay stations during the 78
days of air raids. At 2.06am on 23rd April 1999, a single NATO rocket
– a U.S made rocket – hit RTS headquarters in Belgrade, killing 16 people and
severely wounding 19 of the 120 workers in the building. (2a) (2b)

NATO used the legally invalid US/NATO funded
“International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia” to cover its role in
the bombing of RTS. (3)

In 2001 the ICTY Prosecutor Carla Del Ponte claimed
that Mr Milosevic and Mr Milanovic had been “warned” about the bombing of the TV
headquarters, and were thus responsible for the deaths. There were weeks of
threats and rumours that NATO would attempt such a violation of the Geneva
Convention. But the RTS reporters and staff, like many other citizens of Serbia
voluntarily stayed at their posts.

By 2001, a NATO organised coup had overthrown the
Socialist Government of Serbia and a Belgrade court acting for the new
Government in Belgrade tried and found Mr Milanovic guilty of the deaths of the
RTS workers. Mr Milanovic is the only person to be imprisoned for NATO’s war
crimes.

At 2pm on March 25th 2009, Human Rights
campaigners from Europe and North America, including representatives of the U.S.
based International Action Center, gathered for a conference in Pozarevac,
Serbia, where Mr Milanovic is imprisoned, to organise a campaign to free him.
Earlier in the day, Defense Attorney Tiphaine Dickson, author Peter Handke,
former US Attorney General Ramsey Clark and Vladimir Krsljanin of the People’s
Movement of Serbia visited Mr Milanovic in prison in Pozarevac.

Renowned Serbian journalist Liljana Milanovic spoke
at the conference, noting that RTS was “deliberately bombed” according to the
NATO commander in Europe at the time, General Wesley Clark.

British Prime Minister at the time Tony Blair
admitted that NATO bombed RTS after it showed the carnage from the bombing of
the passenger train on the bridge in the Grdelicka Gauge where 75 civilians were
killed.

Thus NATO’s primary goal in attacking the
broadcasting facility was not to disable the Serbian military command and
control system, as NATO statements later claimed, but an attempt to stifle the
truth. This makes the assault a war crime, as Amnesty International charged in
2000 and repeated in April 2009. To quote Amnesty – “NATO deliberately attacked
a civilian object, killing 16 civilians, for the purpose of disrupting Serbian
television broadcasts in the middle of the night for approximately 3 hours. It
is hard to see how this can be consistent with the rule of proportionality”.

On the 10th Anniversary of the NATO
bombing, Amnesty International issued the following statement – “The bombing of
the headquarters of Serbian state radio and television was a deliberate attack
on a civilian object and as such constitutes a war crime”. Amnesty’s Balkans
expert, Sian Jones, pointed out that victims’ families had never obtained
redress for the consequences of this war crime, and that “ten years on, no
public investigation has ever been conducted by NATO or its member states into
these incidents”.

On April 23rd NATO again rejected the
Amnesty charge, claiming that the ICTY – itself a NATO creation – had absolved
NATO of war crimes in the past.

When NATO spokesman Jamie Shea was asked whether
NATO leaders could ever be indicted by the ICTY, he said, “Without NATO there
would be no Tribunal because NATO countries are in the forefront of those who
have established the Tribunal, who fund this Tribunal and who support its
activities on a daily basis”. (Inter Press Service July 1999)

The ICTY exonerated NATO of responsibility for the
crimes committed against humanity and the bombing with the intent and effect of
unleashing environmental catastrophe.

Mr Milanovic is currently facing new charges –
although he is presumed innocent in this current trial, Pozarevac prison
authorities seem likely to exercise their discretion to decline to afford him
early parole – In Serbian prison practice, an inmate is eligible for release
after serving 50% of a sentence and detainees are released after serving 70% of
it, in nearly all cases – but recent decisions taken do not portend well for Mr
Milanovic’s release.

Taking up the cause of Dragoljub Milanovic is not
only to free an innocent person, it is to vindicate truth. At the meeting in
Pozarevac, Vladimir Krsljanin said. “This case is about freedom, truth and
resistance to NATO”.

(1)NATO violated its own founding Charter, the
Helsinki Final act of the OSCE and the Charter of the United Nations in
launching its bombardments of Serbia. The sovereignty and territorial integrity
guaranteed by the UN Charter was ignored and blatantly bombed one of the UN’s
founding member states, one of the victorious powers in World War II.

(2a) During the time of government of the Socialist Party of Serbia led by Mr
Milosevic, there were some 23 privately-owned independent television stations in
Serbia and many privately-owned independent radio stations in Serbia. Political
opposition parties, opposition newspapers, opposition TV and radio station were
all allowed under the Milosevic Government. The current U.S.A. funded
‘democratic’ government of Serbia allows no platform for opposition tendencies.
In Ireland until very recent times there were very few/far less privately-owned
TV stations besides the dominant State-run Radio Telefis Eireann RTE. Are there
any purely opposition media outlets in Ireland? Have there ever been any???

(2b) Two plane loads of Cruise missiles passed through Ireland in June 1999
during the NATO bombing of Serbia. These were the same type of missiles that
were used in the attack by NATO in 1999 on the TV station in Belgrade, and on
the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade. ( Dr. Edward Horgan, International Secretary,
Irish Peace and Neutrality Alliance).

(3) The “Tribunal” has no jurisdiction whatsoever in this or in any other case.

The “Tribunal” derives its raison d’etre exclusively from Security Council
resolution 827, adopted at the Council’s 3217th meeting on 25th
May 1993. In this resolution, establishing the so-called “International Criminal
Tribunal”, the Security Council states that it acts “under Chapter VII of the
Charter of the United Nations”.

When adopting the above resolution, the security Council acted ultra vires.
According to the provisions of the UN charter, the Council has no competence
whatsoever in judicial matters. The provision of Chapter VII determine the
Council’s competence in matters of international security but not in matters of
criminal justice or other judicial matters. The sole authority in international
judicial matters rests with the International Court of Justice.

The “determination”, in the preamble of Security Council resolution 827,
paragraph four, that the “widespread and flagrant violations of international
humanitarian law” on the territory of the former Yugoslavia “constitute a threat
to international peace and security” does not provide a sound legal basis for
the Security Council acting as a surrogate judicial authority or establishing an
international court with jurisdiction in this or any other case. (Statement of
the International Progress Organisation on the Hague War Crimes Tribunal’s
indictment of Serbian Leaders – Dr Hans Koechler, President – posted 23rd
April 2001)

(Thank you to Professor Heather Cottin , USA and Tiphaine Dickson, Canadian
Defense Attorney specialising in international criminal law. She was the first
woman, as lead counsel, to represent a person accused of genocide before a
United Nations Tribunal. She can be reached at tiphainedickson@mac.com
– Her article “Bombing Media Workers, Blaming Victims, and the Strange Role of
CNN: An Investigation, “Ten Years After the bombing of Radio-Television Serbia”
is published in Counter Punch April 16-20 2009) for information and updates.

Heather’s article available at Workers World – www.workers.org
and Tiphaine’s article is available http://www.counterpunch.org

Motion
Passed/Accepted by Annual General Conference of Amnesty International Ireland

27/28th
March 2010

(The motion below was
carried/accepted unanimously by the Amnesty Conference
)

THE MOTION:
This Annual Conference of Amnesty International Ireland directs the Section’s
Executive Committee to refer the case of Mr Dragoljub Milanovic, former Director
of Radio Television Serbia, to the International Secretariat for investigation
and, if it is found that he is an individual at risk or a prisoner of
conscience, to initiate a campaign for his release.

The following quote was taken
from article: “Bombing Media Workers, Blaming Victims, and the Strange Role of
CNN: An Investigation, Ten Years After the Bombing of Radio-Television Serbia”
by Tiphaine Dickson – Defense Attorney specializing in international criminal
law CounterPunch April 16-30, 2009 Vol. 16, No.8 …

“Dragoljub Milanovic, the
former director of Radio Television Serbia (RTS), which was bombed by NATO on
April 23, 1999, at 2.06am, was convicted on June 21, 2002, of “causing grave
danger to public security” by a Belgrade court, for having failed to evacuate
his workers. 16 people were killed, and as many were injured when a (NATO) bomb
(made in the USA) slammed into the building – news desks, studios, and the
makeup room – in downtown Belgrade. Most of the victims were young people – a
makeup artist, technicians and production personnel. Judge Dragicevic Dicic of
the Belgrade District Court sentenced Mr Milanovic to nine-and-a-half years in
prison. (ED)

He was found to have ignored
an official order to evacuate personnel, but there are credible accounts that
the order produced as evidence was merely an internal draft document bearing
neither stamp nor seal, and did not explicitly require the evacuation of RTS
employees. It is unclear how Mr Milanovic could have known of its existence, let
alone be held to follow it. A witness claimed that the original document had
been burned on October 5, 2000, when a mob set fire to RTS (destroying decades
of film archives) and nearly beat Mr Milanovic to death. The author of the order
(“Order 37”) has not been identified.

Dragoljub Milanovic is to
this day the only person to have ever been tried and punished for NATO’s
bombing. He is currently in custody in Serbia’s Pozarevac prison, having served
almost seven years of his sentence, where I met him last month, as part of an
international delegation – the first one he’d been authorized to meet in seven
years of detention.” End quote taken from article by Tiphaine Dickson –

RTS was bombed during the
course of NATO’s horrific and illegal 78 day bombing campaign against the
peoples of the multi ethnic state of Serbia. The NATO air raids began on 24th
March 1999 –

In the first 30 days of
attacks on Serbia NATO destroyed 25 bridges, 16 major railway stations, 6 major
roads, 7 airports, tens of thousands of factories, offices, residential
buildings, 55 major industrial complexes, 18 oil refineries and dumps, 5 major
agricultural complexes, 300 HA of forests, 21 hospitals, over 200 schools and
colleges, 8 power plants, 23 TV and radio transmitters, 18 medieval monasteries
…… 2 million people left without heating … 500,000 left jobless and 2 million
left without any income. NATO’s use of depleted uranium ammunition has caused
ongoing illness and death to the people of Serbia. *

During March and April 1999,
RTS’s dedicated workers willingly risked danger to transmit to the world words
and images about the NATO bombardment that was targeting the Serbian
infrastructure and slaughtering civilians. **

Despite the existence or not
of directives or Orders, RTS staff chose to remain at their posts in order to
broadcast vital life-saving instructions to the people – For example:
Meteorological bulletins providing wind direction in relation to deadly toxic
smoke – fallout from the bombing of chemical and other industrial plants and oil
storage facilities. To broadcast the whereabouts of mobile medical units –
Civil Defense public notices etc – RTS was in short providing a vital public
service to the residents of Belgrade and neighbouring cities under NATO
attack.

NATO bombs and rockets
destroyed 10 private radio and television stations and 50 TV transmitters and
relay stations during the 78 days of air raids.

It is important to note that
during the 1980’s and 1990’s there were some 23 privately-owned independent
television stations and many privately-owned independent radio stations in
Serbia. Political opposition parties, opposition newspapers, opposition TV and
radio stations were all allowed under the Government of Mr Milosevic.

On March 25th
2009, Human Rights campaigners from Europe and North America, including
representatives of the U.S. based International Action Center, gathered for a
conference in Pozarevac, Serbia, where Mr Milanovic is imprisoned, to organize a
campaign to free him. Earlier in the day, Defense Attorney Tiphaine Dickson,
author Peter Handke, former US Attorney General Ramsey Clark and Vladimir
Krsljanin of the People’s Movement of Serbia visited Mr Milanovic in prison.

Renowned Serbian journalist
Liljana Milanovic spoke at the conference, noting that RTS was “deliberately
bombed” according to the NATO commander in Europe at the time, General Wesley
Clark.

I attended this meeting and
was informed personally by survivors of the NATO attack on RTS that staff were
perfectly free to leave/evacuate the RTS building at any time during the crisis
and that there were no restrictions and that they voluntarily continued with
their duties. They also made it clear to me that they would have ignored any
order from government or elsewhere to evacuate the building.

British Prime Minister at the time Tony
Blair admitted that NATO bombed RTS after it showed the carnage from the bombing
of the passenger train on the bridge in the Grdelicka Gauge where 75 civilians
were killed.

Thus NATO’s primary goal in attacking
the broadcasting facility was not to disable the Serbian military command and
control system, as NATO statements later claimed, but an attempt to stifle the
truth. This makes the assault a war crime, as Amnesty International charged in
2000 and repeated in April 2009. To quote Amnesty – “NATO deliberately attacked
a civilian object, killing 16 civilians, for the purpose of disrupting Serbian
television broadcasts in the middle of the night for approximately 3 hours. It
is hard to see how this can be consistent with the rule of proportionality”.

On the 10th Anniversary of
the NATO bombing, Amnesty International issued the following statement – “The
bombing of the headquarters of Serbian state radio and television was a
deliberate attack on a civilian object and as such constitutes a war crime”.
Amnesty’s Balkans expert, Sian Jones, pointed out that victims’ families had
never obtained redress for the consequences of this war crime, and that “ten
years on, no public investigation has ever been conducted by NATO or its member
states into these incidents”.

On April 23rd NATO again
rejected the Amnesty charge, claiming that the International Criminal Tribunal
for the former Yugoslavia – itself a NATO creation – had absolved NATO of war
crimes in the past.

Taking up the cause of Dragoljub
Milanovic is not only to free an innocent person, it is to vindicate truth. At
the meeting in Pozarevac, Vladimir Krsljanin said. “This case is about freedom,
truth and resistance to NATO”.

I would ask the Conference to
please consider an investigation in to the case of Dragolub Milanovic.

Thank you.

*
NATO violated its own founding Charter, the Helsinki Final act of the OSCE and
the Charter of the United Nations in launching its bombardments of Serbia. The
sovereignty and territorial integrity guaranteed by the UN Charter was ignored
and blatantly bombed one of the UN’s founding member states, one of the
victorious powers in World War II.

**
Two plane loads of Cruise missiles passed through Ireland in June 1999 during
the NATO bombing of Serbia. These were the same type of missiles that were used
in the attack by NATO in 1999 on the TV station in Belgrade, and on the Chinese
Embassy in Belgrade. ( Dr. Edward Horgan, International Secretary, Irish Peace
and Neutrality Alliance).

--------------------------------------------------------------------

The following notes were attached to my original
longer presentation but due to lack of time I had to cut original back to 5
minutes:

(1)NATO violated its own founding Charter, the
Helsinki Final act of the OSCE and the Charter of the United Nations in
launching its bombardments of Serbia. The sovereignty and territorial integrity
guaranteed by the UN Charter was ignored and blatantly bombed one of the UN’s
founding member states, one of the victorious powers in World War II.

(2a) During the time of government of the Socialist Party of
Serbia led by Mr Milosevic, there were some 23 privately-owned independent
television stations in Serbia and many privately-owned independent radio
stations in Serbia. Political opposition parties, opposition newspapers,
opposition TV and radio station were all allowed under the Milosevic Government.
The current U.S.A. funded ‘democratic’ government of Serbia allows no platform
for opposition tendencies. In Ireland until very recent times there were very
few/far less privately-owned TV stations besides the dominant State-run Radio
Telefis Eireann RTE. Are there any purely opposition media outlets in Ireland?
Have there ever been any???

(2b) Two plane loads of Cruise missiles passed through Ireland in
June 1999 during the NATO bombing of Serbia. These were the same type of
missiles that were used in the attack by NATO in 1999 on the TV station in
Belgrade, and on the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade. ( Dr. Edward Horgan,
International Secretary, Irish Peace and Neutrality Alliance).

(3) The “Tribunal” has no jurisdiction whatsoever in this or in
any other case.

The “Tribunal” derives its raison d’etre exclusively from
Security Council resolution 827, adopted at the Council’s 3217th
meeting on 25th May 1993. In this resolution, establishing the
so-called “International Criminal Tribunal”, the Security Council states that it
acts “under Chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations”.

When adopting the above resolution, the security Council acted
ultra vires. According to the provisions of the UN charter, the Council has no
competence whatsoever in judicial matters. The provision of Chapter VII
determine the Council’s competence in matters of international security but not
in matters of criminal justice or other judicial matters. The sole authority in
international judicial matters rests with the International Court of Justice.

The “determination”, in the preamble of Security Council
resolution 827, paragraph four, that the “widespread and flagrant violations of
international humanitarian law” on the territory of the former Yugoslavia
“constitute a threat to international peace and security” does not provide a
sound legal basis for the Security Council acting as a surrogate judicial
authority or establishing an international court with jurisdiction in this or
any other case. (Statement of the International Progress Organisation on the
Hague War Crimes Tribunal’s indictment of Serbian Leaders – Dr Hans Koechler,
President – posted 23rd April 2001)

(Thank you to Professor Heather Cottin , USA and Tiphaine
Dickson, Canadian Defense Attorney specialising in international criminal law.
She was the first woman, as lead counsel, to represent a person accused of
genocide before a United Nations Tribunal. She can be reached at
tiphainedickson@mac.com – Her article “Bombing Media Workers, Blaming Victims,
and the Strange Role of CNN: An Investigation, “Ten Years After the bombing of
Radio-Television Serbia” is published in Counter Punch April 16-20 2009) for
information and updates.

Heather’s article available at Workers World – www.workers.org
and Tiphaine’s article is available http://www.counterpunch.org

Belgrade, March 27. Two days International conference in Belgrade marking 10
years of the start of the NATO aggression on Yugoslavia (Serbia and Crna Gora)
ended up with the calls to dissolve NATO as the aggressive global alliance
aiming at replacing the United Nations and to close up the Hag tribunal (ICTY)
as prolonged NATO anti-Serbian arm. The Conference initiated establishment of
the International Tribunal of the Human Consciences (Tribunal International de
la Consciance Humaine). ...

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